For Sale —American Paradise (7 page)

After all, they told themselves, they were entitled to it.

CHAPTER THREE

A
LIFETIME OF WRESTING A LIVING FROM THE WILDS OF SOUTHERN
F
LORIDA
had made Joe Ashley a hard man. But it also had made him resourceful, practical, and determined, and it had relieved him of any lingering concerns about laws. He was not one to let ethics or propriety stand between him and a dollar. In his book, if you saw a chance to make—or take—a dollar and you stopped to think about right and wrong, you'd probably miss your opportunity. And only a fool would hesitate to take what he could. If the other man wasn't quick enough or smart enough or strong enough to hold on to it, that was his problem.

Ashley and his family—his wife, five sons, and four daughters—moved from a small settlement near the mouth of the Caloosahatchee River on Florida's Gulf Coast to the state's Atlantic coast in 1904. Ashley went to work on one of the crews clearing right-
of-way for the Florida East Coast Railway's relentless southward march to the tip of the peninsula and beyond. Some said that Ashley moved his family because he'd gotten into a gunfight and his seriously wounded opponent had sworn revenge when he recovered.

Aside from matters of style and social graces, Joe Ashley and his clan weren't too different from many of the other dreamers and fortune seekers who started coming to Florida in a steady stream in the first two decades of the twentieth century. They wanted lots and lots of money. But unlike the persevering preacher's son who'd opened the door to the state, many of the newcomers felt they were entitled to wealth, and they didn't have time to work for a lifetime to accumulate it. They wanted it now.

Joe Ashley's son John had inherited his old man's worldview, as well as his uncanny skill with firearms. It was said that John could lay a whiskey bottle on its side on a tree stump and, from thirty paces away, put a bullet through the bottleneck so cleanly that only the bottom of the bottle would be broken.

John also inherited his father's skills as a woodsman. And something—perhaps Joe's spare-no-rod parenting style—had made John just plain mean.

In late 1911, John, now in his early twenties, went on a hunting and trapping expedition in the Everglades northwest of Fort Lauderdale. During this hunting
trip, his youthful greed and impulsiveness and his inherent ruthlessness would prompt him to kill a young husband and father because he wanted something that was worth a small fortune. And he wanted it immediately.

Only the man he killed saw John Ashley commit the crime, but the evidence against him was airtight. He should have swung from the gallows soon after he was arrested and charged with the murder, and the world would have been rid of him. But clever lawyers played the legal system to keep the noose from Ashley's neck. And his backwoods cunning, his cold-blooded daring, and some plain old good luck took over from there.

For a decade after John Ashley dodged the hangman's noose, he and his family, aided by a few career criminals who joined them, did pretty much as they pleased in southeastern Florida between Fort Pierce and the Florida Keys. They robbed banks and bootleggers. They made and sold moonshine and hauled whiskey from the Bahamas. They made fools of some cops and killed others, and they eluded capture by intimidating all who would offer evidence against them. And when things got too hot, they disappeared into the Everglades.

John Ashley's criminal career started with a hunting trip.

In early November 1911, John left his family's home just south of Stuart for a hunting and trapping expedition in the Everglades. He loaded camping gear, food, a tent, several guns, and dozens of traps into his canoe. He was especially interested in trapping otters. Otter fur was valuable and would fetch a handsome price in Miami and Fort Lauderdale.

But as Christmas approached, Ashley had nothing to show for more than a month in the wilds. On December 19, Ashley stopped at the encampment of Homer Tindall, a young man about his own age who was on a hunting expedition with his father. The Tindalls were camped near the dredge
Caloosahatchee
, a floating earth-
mover that was working on the North New River Canal, a drainage canal being built about twenty-five miles west of Fort Lauderdale.

Ashley stayed in the Tindalls' camp a couple of days. He and Homer watched Seminole Indians coming and going on the canal, and Ashley wondered if the Indians had had better luck with their traps than he'd had with his.

On the morning of Thursday, December 21, Ashley left the Tindalls' camp and paddled up the canal to a Seminole encampment a few miles from the
Caloosahatchee
.

The Seminoles had indeed had better luck, accumulating a pile of eighty-four otter pelts, cured and ready for market. They were worth a lot of money, and John Ashley eyed them enviously.

Among the Seminoles was Desoto Tiger, twenty-
five years old and oldest son of Tom Tiger, a Seminole chief who had died about a decade earlier. Like his father, Desoto Tiger was highly respected by his tribesmen. He spoke perfect English and was married with two small children—a boy, four, and an infant daughter.

After eyeing the otter hides, Ashley disappeared for a couple of days.

The crew of the
Caloosahatchee
shut down to take a Christmas holiday, but on Christmas Day, John Ashley showed up at the dredge with a couple gallons of whiskey. The Seminoles, who were camped nearby, came to the dredge and joined Ashley for an evening of Christmas cheer. Word spread, and soon a sizable crowd had assembled.

It was a relatively tame party for a gang of young men gathered deep in the Everglades with gallons of whiskey. Still, there was a mishap. One of the Seminoles who'd had too much to drink fell from the upper deck of the dredge. Although he was seriously injured, the party continued.

After an evening of boozing, Ashley showed up at the Seminoles' camp around daybreak. He showed no interest in resuming his hunting and trapping expedition. Instead, he parked himself in the Indians' camp and started guzzling whiskey. He stayed there several days, drinking. And apparently the way he eyed the Indians' stack of pelts made them uneasy. The Seminoles tried to get Ashley to leave, but he wouldn't budge. So they decided to move their valuable stash to the
Caloosahatchee
, where it would be more secure.

Desoto Tiger was chosen to move the hides to the dredge. Early Friday morning, December 29, 1911, Tiger and Ashley watched other Seminoles load the furs into Tiger's canoe, which was equipped with a sail. As Tiger got into the canoe to start the trip to the dredge, Ashley asked to join him, saying he wanted to go to the dredge to buy some food. Ashley brought his rifle—a handsome, .38-55 caliber, Model 1894, lever-
action Winchester—with him, but left all of his other gear at the Seminoles' camp. Desoto Tiger placed a pistol in the canoe next to where he would stand to propel the vessel with a pole.

John Ashley and Desoto Tiger left the camp shortly before eight a.m. Around ten a.m., the crew aboard the
Caloosahatchee
saw John Ashley glide by in a canoe. He was alone.

Later that day, another Seminole took his tribesman who'd been injured Christmas night to Fort Lauderdale to see a doctor.

The following day, Desoto Tiger's uncle, Jim Gopher, was worried. His nephew hadn't returned to camp, nor had he been seen since the previous morning when he'd gotten into the canoe with John Ashley. Jim Gopher set out to find his nephew.

He went first to the
Caloosahatchee
, but the crew there hadn't seen Desoto Tiger.

Jim Gopher kept looking. He found an oar in the saw grass next to the canal. It was his nephew's. Clearly something had gone wrong during the short trip from the Seminoles' camp to the
Caloosahatchee
.

Jim Gopher went back to the dredge. There, he met his tribesman who'd taken the injured Seminole to Fort Lauderdale. He told Jim Gopher that he'd seen John Ashley in the canal near Fort Lauderdale around four p.m. the previous day. Ashley's own boat was still in the Seminoles' camp in the Everglades.

On Sunday morning, December 31, Melville Forrey, the captain of the
Caloosahatchee
, led a search party seeking Desoto Tiger. Jim Gopher took them to the spot where he'd found the oar. As the wake from their small boat rolled toward the canal bank, a human body suddenly floated to the surface. It was Desoto Tiger. He'd been shot twice.

One bullet had struck him between the eyes and exited the back of his head. The other had struck him in the chest but hadn't exited. Forrey got out his knife and dug out the bullet. It was a .38-55 caliber slug.

James Girtman couldn't believe that the sunburned young man who came to his store on Saturday morning, December 30, was John Ashley. The last time he'd seen Ashley, he was a little kid in short breeches. But here he was, and he had otter pelts to sell, eighty-four of them.

Girtman made Ashley an offer—$584 for the lot, and not a nickel more. Ashley thought that was a mighty cheap price. But, he admitted, he hadn't gone to a lot of trouble to get the hides. He'd trapped some of them and swapped for the others. So he was willing to sell them for what Girtman offered.

Girtman gave Ashley $84 in cash and told him to come back shortly for the rest of the money. When Ashley returned, he was decked out in new clothes. He went with Girtman to a bank, where Girtman cashed a check and gave $500 to Ashley.

It was a lot of walking-around money for 1911—more than $14,000 in twenty-first-century dollars. John Ashley hired a cab to drive him to West Palm Beach. The cabbie dropped him off in what was delicately referred to in those days as the “red-
light district.” Flush with cash, Ashley went into a whorehouse, intent on a night of single-minded pleasure.

Ashley's exuberance got the better of him, however, and soon the cops were hauling him off to jail for recklessly shooting up the house. No one was injured, but Ashley had raised quite a ruckus. The West Palm Beach police hadn't heard about the killing in the Everglades. Ashley paid his $25 bail, collected his guns—including his prized Winchester—and left town aboard the northbound Florida East Coast Railway passenger train. It was New Year's Eve, 1911. John Ashley didn't know it, but he was a wanted man. And it wasn't because he'd skipped bail for shooting up a whorehouse. He was wanted for murder.

Stories about the brutal murder of a respected Seminole Indian in the Everglades started appearing in newspapers soon after New Year's Day, and the name “J. H. Ashley” was connected to the crime. Word reached Joe Ashley's house that the cops were looking for his son. On January 3, 1912, John Ashley said good-bye to his family and headed west for New Orleans. From there, he made his way to San Francisco, and then north to the Pacific Northwest, where he hired on with a logging crew out of Seattle.

The police would learn nothing about John Ashley's whereabouts from his family. But they didn't give up the search, nor did the Seminole Tribe.

On January 12, nine days after Ashley's hasty departure from Florida, a dignified and well-spoken Sioux Indian from Muskogee, Oklahoma, sat down for
a special meeting with the Palm Beach County Board of Commissioners. The Native American's name was James W. Strongheart. He was the grandson of the famous warrior Sitting Bull, and he was related to Desoto Tiger by marriage. He'd come to Florida to try to track down the man who'd killed his in-
law.

Strongheart had been to the Everglades, where he'd made his own inquiries into the death of Desoto Tiger. He was convinced that John Ashley had killed Desoto Tiger for the otter pelts.

Strongheart wanted the county commissioners to offer a reward for Ashley, but county attorney H. L. Bussey said the county wasn't allowed to use public money for that purpose. The commissioners could, however, request Florida governor Park Trammell to offer a reward, and they were willing to do that.

Strongheart was convinced that a large reward would be more likely to get results. So a week after his meeting with the Palm Beach County commissioners, he met with a multimillionaire businessman who'd recently arrived in Miami. The new resident was a Midwesterner, a dynamic, energetic man who had a few ideas for a real estate venture.

Strongheart described the details of the death of Desoto Tiger and explained what he was trying to do. The man who'd killed his in-law was little more than an animal. He had to be captured and brought to justice. A big reward would be a powerful inducement for someone to come forward with information that could lead to his capture and conviction.

The businessman listened to Strongheart's request and agreed. Tell the newspapers that I'll kick in a contribution to the reward fund, he said.

Strongheart was elated. He talked to a reporter for the
Miami Daily Metropolis
at Girtman Bros. Groceries on Twelfth Street, where John Ashley had sold his ill-gotten otter hides a few weeks earlier.

The January 18, 1912, edition of the
Metropolis
published a front-page, above-
the-fold story saying that Carl G. Fisher, “a wealthy resident who is from Indiana,” would pay a $500 reward for information that led to the conviction of the murderer of Desoto Tiger.